I am surprised nobody is talking about the 2026 power unit regulations and in particular that
there will now be cost caps for power unit R&D.
I think much of this was released in August, but I think it was formalized yesterday.
Previously the cost to teams was set, but the amount of money each power unit manufacture might spend on R&D was unbounded. You could spend as much as you want and sell the engines under cost if you wanted to do so.
The 2026 power unit regulations, do things like remove the MGU-H, have a much more proscriptive ICE design (ICE is becoming more and more spec) and also tries to focus the creativity on the electric side, it also has limitations on the numbers and types of dynamometers that can be used and operational hours per year.
But I think the big news is the cost caps
These start in Jan 2023 are $95 Million USD annually through 2025 and then $130 Million USD 2026 and beyond. Just like the budget caps for the teams, there are exceptions for various things, but I think a key one is that manufacturing and servicing of customer engines is excluded. So this cap seems to be focused on R&D and not "production and support".
Here is a good summary...
https://www.f1technical.net/news/23930
Overall, I think this is why are you seeing someone like Ford agree to partner with Red Bull Powertrain. The new regulations are likely to prevent drastic performance differences, focus on the electric side as differentiators in solutions and ensure that development costs can be defined in advance. So someone like a Ford, Chevy, etc. can know going in what the maximum spend might be.
Is it a coincidence that when it was announced that the group of six power unit manufactures has signed up that at nearly the same time we hear about the Ford/RBPT link up? I think not.
Richard